


Summoning a demon

by ilse_writes



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Demons, Attempt at Humor, Corona virus fic, Demon Derek Hale, Demon Summoning, Gen, Hellhound Derek Hale, Human Stiles Stilinski, Lockdown Fic, M/M, Making This Up As I Go
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-13
Updated: 2021-03-20
Packaged: 2021-03-21 01:41:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 6,220
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30014193
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ilse_writes/pseuds/ilse_writes
Summary: De'rek gets summoned to do what?!
Relationships: Derek Hale & Stiles Stilinski
Comments: 9
Kudos: 33





	1. The first summoning

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this on my phone, lying in bed. I really enjoy waking up this way! :-)  
> There's gonna be more to this story, but I don't know what or when yet. I just wanted to share this bit with you first. I hope you'll like it as much as I do!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Title says it all: The first summoning.

The first words he hears are almost always the same. "Oh my god! It worked!"

Why they bother calling on God when summoning a demon, he'll never understand. It's not like she looks kindly upon these things. The people calling upon her are more likely to call a smithing over themselves, you know, if she would ever bother to listen to those who are calling her. Hell always listens. They are bound to listen, whether they want to or not.   
Which is why De'rek is now here, wherever 'here' is. It's pretty cramped, that's what it is. The summoning circle only barely fits between the dresser and the bed. Something pokes in De'rek's back: the handle of a desk drawer. He pulls up from his ungainly sprawl. He was visiting with B'oyd and Eric'ha when he was suddenly pulled away to this dimension. He groans a little when he realises he has probably spilled his whine over their new carpet. White carpet, because Eric'ha is evil like that; she takes pleasure in tormenting her friends and forces them to take off their shoes when they enter her private domain. 

"Huh. You don't have hooves. I thought the devil had hooves," a voice says, sounding nonplussed. 

De'rek clamps down on the urge to pull his feet in and hide them underneath his legs. His feet which have their soft, humanoid shape, because he knows better than scratching up Eric'ha's furniture with his claws.  
Demons come in many shapes and sizes. De'rek has some he prefers over others, although not all of those forms are fit for when you are visiting friends. Shedding fur is frowned upon by those who have white carpet flooring.  
He is lucky the summoning startled him enough to call out the fangs and claws on his hands. At least now he looks sufficiently dangerous. Humans are scared easily, it won't be - 

"Dude! Where are your eyebrows?!" 

"Don't call me dude," he says on a growl, forgetting himself shortly. 

"Yeah," the human in the room with him drawls, glancing at a printed sheet of paper in his hands. "Not gonna be able to pronounce your real name, dude. It's hella long and I'm sure there are some syllables in there the human tongue was never meant to pronounce."  
Before De'rek can react, the boy - for it is a boy, of maybe not even twenty yearly cycles - continues. "It's lucky your summoning spell was in common Latin, or I would've never managed to get it out in the right way. I could very well have set myself on fire or something." 

"Too bad you didn't," De'rek can't help but mutter. The boy wasn't too far off with his reasoning: mispronouncing a summoning spell was often cause for excruciating pain on the side of the summoner. They considered themselves lucky when Death came to whisk them away. To Hell, of course, because again: God doesn't look kindly upon those who summon demons.

Not that De'rek was the kind of demon that was easily summoned. He didn't use to be. Like the kid said: his real name was too difficult to pronounce for the beings in this dimension. It wasn't until he was bound to that simple summoning spell that he was forced to show up when some bone headed individual decided he needed a demon of destruction for whatever the hell his hate-addled mind considered a plan. 

De'rek pushes himself in an upright position so the drawer handle isn't pressing in on his spine anymore. He doesn't bother with standing up to try and reclaim some dignity. This wasn't the worst state he was summoned in. At least he wasn't in the middle of shaving this time.  
Then he registeres what he is sitting on: a flattened cardboard box. The boy hadn’t even chalked the summoning circle on the floor, as was traditional. Gone were the days where a proper summoning circle was drawn on a stone - or at least oaken - floor, with candles on the corners of the pentagram. De'rek doesn't see candles. He does see little plastic lights, that flicker in a false sensimile of candle light. He takes his words back: this _is_ the most humiliating summoning he'd ever had.  
"What do you want?" he grits out. He has to bite his tongue to not add 'Master', a degrading side effect of the summoning spell. 

"You're the Lord of Destruction, right?" the boy asks. De'rek nods. His uncle is the actual Lord, but the boy doesn't really need to know that. It would do no good to unleash Peet'ehr in this dimension, nothing would be left of it and De'rek likes the coffee here.  
"Good!" the boy answers brightly and tosses something plastic with buttons in De'rek's lap. "You're gonna help me destroy the other players!"


	2. Companion

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> De'rek discovers the reason why Stiles summoned him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This demon shit tickles my writing muse. Or something. Anyway. Have another chapter!

De'rek is running across the Eternal Plains of Damnation when he feels the familiar pull. He has just enough time to mutter a heartfelt "fuck" before he crosses the veil and finds himself… "Oh for Hell's sake, not again."

Sitting on the bed right next to the cardboard farce of a summoning circle is the same boy as last time. He is pressed up against the wall and seems severely more spooked than the first time he'd summoned De'rek. "Oh my god," he stammers, eyes frantically searching the paper in his hands. "You're a… you're not… I must have done something wrong, but I'd swear I did everything just like last time."

De'rek turns his head. Circle of white chalk on cardboard. Check. Cheap plastic tea lights on batteries. Check. Lanky student dressed in joggers and a university tee. Check. Smell of Cheetos and spunk clogging his nose. Check. Just like last time.

He didn't tell a damned soul about what happened last time. When Eric'ha asked if his little trip had been worth it to spill wine all over her fancy new carpet, he'd answered it was someone who wanted to get revenge on an ex. You'd be surprised to know how many people summon a demon to get back at an ex. They ask the craziest things of De'rek, from destroying someone's property up to - but not limited to - murder. He never kills, not intentionally at least, he is not a hitman for hire. The summoner may want to pay the price, which is decades of personal servitude to De'rek, yet the demon isn't. He likes his peace and quiet, he doesn't need a whole slew of lesser demons at his beck and call. Isaac is an exception, a fairly recent one. You just don't hurt kids. That's a big no in De'rek's book. There's a special place in Hell for those people; Isaac's father would be able to give you a review by now. One star at the most, probably. One out of ten, would not recommend.

Meanwhile, the boy is slowly gliding into a state of panic. He is simultaneously frozen in place, as far away from De'rek as he can manage in the small space, and almost vibrating with frantic movement. It’s quite something. His head keeps snapping up and down between De’rek and the paper in his hand. The same paper he used last time, with the humiliating low level summoning spell that makes De’rek always feel like the butt end of a joke. Which was precisely the intention, no doubt about it. Current case in point.

"Whadda ya want?" he slurs past the large fangs of this form. It sounds more like a threatening growl and the boy reacts accordingly. He jumps up and flattens himself against the wall, desperately watching his only exit: the door behind the demon he summoned. He doesn’t even register bumping his head on the bookshelf above his bed. A superhero figurine falls off the far end, landing on the bed with a soft thump.  
De’rek can't have him leaving. His work here is not done yet, his purpose not yet fulfilled. He can't go back to his own dimension without. So he wills the canines in his jaw back to a more manageable size and tries again. "What do you want?"

The boy's head snaps back to him with such speed that De’rek almost fears it'll break his neck. Which would make him free to go, but…  
He repeats his question again, slower and less growly.

The hands that were clutched against the boy's chest slowly lower and he leans in minutely to peer at De'rek. "It's you, isn't it? This whole grotesque monster thing, that's you."

The demon growls.

A nervous chuckle escapes the boy. "Ah, yes, as touchy as last time. It definitely is you." He sags down on the bed in a heap, his adrenaline filled nervous system too tense to make his legs relax properly. "So you have different appearances, okay. I can work with that." He nods vigorously. "Gotta say, I liked the other shape better, even sans the eyebrows. You had opposable thumbs then. Dude, that's gotta be a huge downside of being a," he gestures up and down over the demon's shape, "whatever freak of nature thing this is!"  
De'rek's snarl doesn't do much to stop him. "Yeah, yeah, don't call you dude. You said it the last time. Still not able to pronounce your real name, big guy. Because, damn, you're huge! You barely fit in the summoning circle."  
The demon looks down at his clawed paws that press up against the chalked lines. He is actually bigger than this, the circle restricts his size a good deal. In his full size he would take up the whole bed, at least.  
"I keep thinking I have to tell you not to chew on the furniture. Would a rolled up newspaper work on you? Do I have to get a spray bottle? Dude, is this what a Hell Hound looks like? Because, I gotta say, it's like nothing I imagined and at the same time it is. Pure nightmare fodder, that's what you are!"

De’rek doesn't want to know what this kid's nightmares are about when he can look like  _ this _ and the boy still talks his head off like nothing is the matter. And it's not even a fear reaction, he discovers, because ten minutes later the boy is still talking even though his adrenaline has leveled out.

The demon learns a lot of things from the kid’s ramblings. They’re in his dorm room, hence why he drew the summoning circle on a large, flattened cardboard box and used electric candles. “Can’t draw on the floor, dude, I would lose my deposit. That’s 400 dollars I can’t afford to miss. And open fire is strictly forbidden. Too many students have set their curtains on fire.”  
They are also the only people - as far as De’rek counts as ‘people’ - on the whole floor. “Everybody else has escaped this place to go into lockdown at home. Most of ‘m were even lucky enough to escape the state altogether. ‘Cause I gotta tell you, big guy, this state takes the whole pandemic thing extremely seriously. Which is a good thing, you know, because people actually die from this stupid virus, but, you know, it kinda sucks too. Everything is closed. The only things open are like the supermarket and the doctor’s office. And there is only so much take out I can order without going either flat out broke or getting a heart attack.”

He also tells De’rek how his father is a sheriff in a neighbouring state and that he’d ordered his son to stay at his dorm because of the nature of his job. “He comes into contact with a lot of people. I worry about him, you know? I wish I could be there with him, but I also understand why he wants to keep me out of the way. And we talk on the phone and over Skype and stuff, it’s not like we can’t keep in touch. But, it’s different. I miss him, even though we talk more frequently now than we did before this pandemic.” There’s a sad tone to the boy’s scent. “My friends too. We talk over the phone and online gaming is still very much a thing, but…”

De’rek understands now why the boy summoned him. It’s hardly the first time someone summoned him for the sole purpose of being with them, though the reason behind that was often a lot more carnal. Some of the old texts have illustrations of him in his humanoid form, it gives people ideas. The boy’s motives don’t seem to have anything to do with that. He’s just... lonely.

At some point, De’rek lies down, curling up to fit inside the circle as comfortably as possible. Because of the magical properties of the circle, he shrinks in size some more in order to make him fit; something that doesn’t escape the boy’s notice. “Huh, you look just like a dog now,” he observes from his spot on the bed.

De’rek glares at him with one eye, the side of his maw lifting in a threatening growl. 

The boy lifts his hand in apology. “Okay, dude, not a dog. Definitely not a dog! It’s not like pets are allowed in this place anyway.”  The demon levels him with a withering glare. “Sorry! Sorry! Not calling you dude. Or a dog. Or a pet.” 

The boy picks up the paper again, reading over the summoning spell. He’s actually silent for a while, a first since De’rek came here. It’s unsettling at first, until he puts it out of his mind and allows himself to drift off for a bit. It’s not like there’s much the boy can do to him. Or  _ will _ do, his mind supplies unprompted.

When the human boy starts to talk again, he wakes the demon from his slumber. De’rek is surprised he actually managed to sleep in the presence of his summoner. Yet another thing he will never talk about.

“This summoning spell is a bit odd,” the boy says, sounding like he mostly talks to himself. “I’ve read up on you and you would think it would be a whole lot more difficult to summon you. This spell is almost too easy, I shouldn’t be able to summon a demon of your level with it. So why are you compelled to heed this spell? It’s almost like…” He shakes his head. “Nah, I doubt there would be someone able to punish the Lord of Destruction. Unless it would be…” The boy directs his attention at the demon curled up on his floor. “Did you piss off Lucifer?!”

De’rek rolls his eyes at the stupidity of that notion. You’d have to be a fool of truly epic proportions to anger the Lord of Hell itself. The boy seems to realise it too, because he laughs at his own remark and looks back at the paper. 

“Wait a minute… Oh my god, can it truly be that simple?” The boy scrambles over to the foot end of his bed and dives over the edge to grab something from underneath it. The action brings him inside the range of the summoning circle, almost touching De’rek’s haunches. It’s extremely foolish of the boy, yet he doesn’t seem to realise his mistake. And De’rek… De’rek does nothing. He stays where he is, large head resting on his front paws. 

The boy sits up again with a bright yellow marker in his hand. He brings it down on the paper, concentration furrowing his brows. When he’s done he checks his work two times before he looks back at De’rek.   
“Dude, your name is woven into the spell! Like, that whole long ass name of yours is in here! Letter by letter. Is that why the spell works on you?”

The demon doesn’t reply. He doesn’t have to confirm it for the boy to know it’s true. 

“De… rekh...qus ra…” The boy tries to pronounce the name and then blows a raspberry at the paper. “You know what, dude? I’m not even gonna try! I’ll just call you Derek. Close enough.”

De’rek blanches underneath his black fur. How did the boy…? Did he know? How? The ‘long ass name’ is his official name, his true name, yet in day to day life he goes by another monniker. And the boy has come closer to that particular name than any human has ever gotten. It brings him within reach of having power over De’rek, even more than the summoning circle gives him. 

The boy doesn’t notice his panic. He just prattles on, no sign of malcontent whatsoever. The demon relaxes minutely. “Well, nice to meet you Derek! I’m Stiles!” 

This human has an astonishing way of surprising De’rek. His words come out clearly despite the fangs. “What the hell is a Stiles?”

The boy in question chuckles. “That’s me, dude, I’m Stiles. It’s a nickname. We’ve got the long ass impossible to pronounce names in common.”


	3. Hospitality

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> De'rek is a coffee snob.

On his third visit, the demon starts to educate the human in hospitality. If he is having guests over, demon or not, he should at least offer them a place to sit and a drink. Stiles doesn’t object to that, instead he colours a rich shade of red and then gestures to the desk chair just outside the summoning circle. Of course, De’rek can’t reach that. And Stiles is too much of a chicken to push the chair in, afraid of what will happen if he gets within reach of his demon visitor. De’rek rolls his eyes at that. If he’d wanted to harm Stiles he would have already. The human doesn’t budge for that argument and Derek remains standing in the middle of the circle for a few awkward minutes until he can return to his own world. 

However, when he is summoned today, the desk chair sits in the middle of the circle. De’rek happened to be standing when he was summoned and he is still standing, albeit now on the wobbly seat of Stiles’ chair. Stiles slaps a hand over his nose and mouth to hold back on his laughter, though he isn’t very successful.   
The demon just stares at him impassively, until the laughing fit is over. Then he graciously steps down from the chair, careful to stay inside the confines of the circle. He doesn’t need to scorch his jacket. He carefully sits down in the chair, pleased to find it is adjustable. 

“I made you a drink too,” Stiles says, eyes still wet from laughing so hard, and he gestures to somewhere by De’rek’s feet. The demon leans down to pick up the stainless steel travel mug that smells vaguely of coffee.  
“Or, well, the coffee maker at our floor sprung a fuse, so I had to get downstairs to the coffee machine down in the main hall, but you know, if it can get students through midterm, it will surely be okay to drink for a -”

De’rek holds up a hand to make Stiles stop rambling. It’s only when the human has pressed his lips tightly together to show he will not say anything, that De’rek takes a sip of the provided drink. It’s… Well, some would say it’s the thought that counts. Not De’rek though.

There’s a knock on the door and he pointedly looks at Stiles to open it. The boy does, more out of confusion than obedience. 

“Come on, man!” Isaac starts as soon as the door is opened for him. “You couldn’t wait until I was out of the shower? I didn’t even have time to grab a towel.”   
The young man on the doorstep is dressed haphazardly in a green barista’s apron, his curls drip with water and in his hand is a take away cup of coffee. He steps around Stiles and takes the two paces it takes to reach the summoning circle. He doesn’t hand over the coffee yet, though. “You were lucky the coffee shop is closed right now. It would’ve raised a lot of eyebrows if I showed up at work -”

“Naked,” Stiles says from his spot back at the door. “You’re naked.”

“Ding ding ding!” Isaac crows with a heavy dose of sarcasm as he turns around to the room’s main resident. The apron leaves his backside bare. “We’ve got a winner here!” 

“Isaac.” De’rek’s command makes him turn to him again. Another pointed look makes the young man hand him his coffee. The demon takes it and lifts the lid to get a whiff of the delicious aroma. He hums contentedly, ignoring Stiles’ flabbergasted look.

Isaac uses the short moment in which De’rek’s attention isn’t on him to look around. He cranes his neck at the photographs that are hanging at the edge of the bookshelf above Stiles’ bed. “Is that Scott? Are you friends with McCall?” he asks, sounding suddenly a lot more enthused. “Wait, are you Stiles?”

“Goodbye, Isaac,” De’rek says, cutting the young man’s line of questioning off by sending him back to where he came from with an audible click. It always sounds rather like a lock that clicks in place, which is fitting, if you ask De’rek. He just closed a portal after all.

“Where did he go?” Stiles asks bewilderedly. “Who was that? Is he another demon? What was he doing here?”

“Bringing me coffee,” De’rek answers, in a more lenient mood now he has his fix of freshly grounded beans in his hand. He sits back in the desk chair Stiles provided for him, swiveling gently from side to side. “That instant stuff you call coffee is atrocious.”


	4. Celebrating your birthday during a pandemic

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What do you do when it's your birthday while the world is fighting a pandemic? You eat cake with a demon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Little reminder: this is fiction, people!

"... to you!" Scott draws out the last 'you' until his voice cracks, only seconds before Stiles' eardrums would have shattered. 

He fondly watches the face of his best friend on the screen, who's smiling broadly despite needing to catch his breath after singing that loud. "Thanks, bro."

Scott inches even closer to the camera, blocking out the view of the backroom at Deaton’s clinic. It’s a miracle his singing had not set off the dogs. "I can't believe you're not here to celebrate your birthday!" 

"I can't believe you called me at 8 am on a saturday!"

"Sorry dude, I always forget about that time difference." Scott really looks like he is sorry, which makes Stiles forgive him for waking him up.

"That's okay, man, it's only an hour anyway. I'll live." He'll probably turn over and try to get back to sleep after this call. "But, yeah, weird not being able to celebrate my birthday with you. Although we wouldn’t have been able to go to Jungle anyway, since they're closed."

Scott grimaces. "Not much to do here, no. Everything is closed, except for, like, basic necessities. Luckily people can still come here.” 

Stiles nods his agreement. "Taking your dog to the vet has become a real outing, I guess."

"Did I tell you I treated a dog with blisters on his feet this week? He was being walked by ten different people a day, just because they needed an excuse to get out of the house!" Scott adjusts the face mask that is shoved below his chin. "Not real blisters, you know, but close. Poor animal could use a vacation!"

Stiles listens to his friend ramble on about the dog, while he thinks - not for the first time - about another dog. Or, hellhound. Demon. Whatever fits the description. Ever since he saw Derek in that dog or wolf like shape, he thinks about taking him out for a walk.   
The virus is spreading fast in the city he is in and to contain it, everybody is ordered to stay home as much as possible. If you’re not working in a critical job, you’re only allowed outside to get groceries and do things like walk the dog. Being a student living in a tiny dorm room, Stiles doesn't have a pet. Except now he has. Kind of?  
He fully expects Derek to bite his face off when he presents him the idea.

"Oh, by the way! Isaac said he met you! How did that happen?" 

"Huh?" Stiles is pulled from his thoughts about whether or not Derek would wear a leash by the sudden change of subject. 

"Isaac! You know, my buddy that works at that fancy coffee shop on Mainstreet," Scott explains. "He asked about you."

"Oh, uh, yeah." Stiles scratches the back of his head sheepishly. "We uh, we met the other d… a while back."

"Small world!" Scott smiles, luckily not finding his friend's reluctant answer odd. "He asked if you often did stupid shit. I just told him that was a given, right?!" 

Stiles laughs with him, albeit somewhat forced. Yes, he is commonly known for getting up in 'stupid shit', although none of his teenage shenanigans rank up to summoning a demon because he is bored and lonely, stuck in a dormroom by himself during a pandemic. Stiles obviously hasn’t told Scott about what he's been up to. Nobody knows. Well, maybe Lydia has her suspicions, seeing as he had asked her to help him with the Latin translations. But she hasn’t said a thing, just made him promise to pay for lunch as soon as they could meet up in person again. So clearly she expects him to still be alive by then. 

When Scott hangs up to get back to his furry patients, Stiles is awake enough to scroll through his birthday messages. There's one from early this morning, from his dad who came out of his night shift. The sheriff promises to call him this afternoon. He has a voice text from Lydia, with 'Jackson says congratulations too' tacked on at the end, and various other messages from friends and family. It's all very nice, but he's still alone, isn't he? Not for the first time Stiles regrets listening to his father when told he would be safer isolated in his dorm than back home.  
He gets it, he really does. Melissa brings home enough horror stories from the hospital to know this whole pandemic situation is very serious. People lose their lives, and not just the infirm or eldery. He doesn't mind wearing a face mask and washing his hands until his skin is raw, if it helps keeping people safe. Lydia sent him a tube of hand cream for that anyway. It sucks that most businesses in the hospitality sector are closed right now, but it doesn’t affect his day to day life a lot. He's too poor to go out for dinner often and he often doesn't have the time to go clubbing either, between his studies and his part time job at the university’s library. Which is closed now, just like the rest of the university. All of his classes are online now, some professors catching up with the transition easier than others. It's not just the old fossils that have trouble navigating the digital world. Just yesterday Stiles spent two hours looking up a professor's hairy nostrils. The guy is forty years old at best, you'd think he knew how to angle his camera. Or how to use a clipper.

Mail services still work, fortunately. Scott has sent him a cool shirt of the Joker, Lydia and Jackson have sent him a card and Batman socks, all things that fit through a mail slot. Except for the box that gets delivered around noon: Melissa has baked him a freaking cake! How she has time to do that in between working extremely long hours at the hospital is beyond him. The woman is a Saint, literally. 

Now, Stiles can eat a lot. Like,  _ a lot _ a lot. But a whole birthday cake by himself is a bit much. Besides, he finds himself tearing up when eating the third piece, suddenly feeling the profound sadness of having to eat your birthday cake all by yourself.   
So he slides the large slab of cardboard from underneath his bed and positions his desk chair just so that part of it is inside the circle. That way his visitor doesn’t land on top of it, yet he can still grab it to sit down. Stiles places a large slice of cake on a paper plate and puts that on the seat, as well as a bottle of water and a can of soda. He doesn’t dare to offer him coffee, not since there was suddenly a naked barista barging into his room because the dorm house coffee was below par.

It is still weird to see a person - demon - materialise out of nothing in the middle of your room. One second the circle is empty, you blink, and there’s someone there. Stiles hasn’t managed not to blink. He tried, he really did, hoping to catch some halfway there shape or something. But it didn’t work. He says the summoning spell, he blinks and there is Derek as a whole. Or De -  _ weird tongue sound in the middle that Stiles can’t make  _ \- rek -  _ a whole lot of other syllables and clicks  _ \- and something that looks like _ Haele  _ at the end.

By now, Stiles has worked out that the demon gets yanked out of his dimension into this by the summoning, no matter what he is doing at the time. So far, Stiles has seen him with and without his shoes, with and without his leather jacket and once in the shape of an enormous, wolfish dog which he assumes is a hellhound. When on two feet, the demon wears clothes that are eerily similar to the clothes that Stiles sees in his own world. You would think Derek shops here, although Stiles can’t imagine how that would go. While Derek has a humanoid body, there are still some very distinctive features that give him away as a creature from hell. His forehead and nose are ridged and where you’d expect eyebrows there’s nothing. His teeth are more like fangs, although Stiles has noticed the demon can vary their length. Shorter fangs make it easier to speak, although Derek is not very talkative.

“Do you shop online?” is the first thing Stiles blurts out when he sees Derek’s appearance. The demon is wearing dark jeans that look like they’re painted on and a charcoal grey henley. He is once again sans shoes. The moment Stiles looks down he swears the nails change, they become darker and longer, more pointy too. 

“Do I -  _ what _ ?” If Derek had eyebrows, they would be arched high right now. The demon is standing in the middle of the circle, his clawed hands resting on his hips. He looks like an angry soccer mom.

“Shop online,” Stiles says, gesturing towards the form fitting clothes. If it were not for the claws and the slightly Klingon-like appearance, the demon would look hot. Actually, if Stiles is truly honest with himself, he can even see the appeal right now. Isolation must be messing with his mind.  
“Nevermind,” he says when it doesn’t look like Derek is gonna answer him. If anything, he looks annoyed. “Did I interrupt something?”

The demon is silent for a second, as if he contemplates whether to say anything or not. “Does it matter?” he eventually asks somewhat begrudgingly.

“Guess not,” Stiles says, shrugging a little. “You’re here now anyway.” It’s not like Stiles can turn back time and make the summoning undone. Besides, he has no idea what Derek’s life in the other dimension is like. What do demons do all day? Torturing the souls of the damned? Surely Derek could use a little break from that, right?

“Would you like some cake?”

“What?” Derek’s eyes go big and round with surprise.

“Demon says what?”  
Derek doesn’t entertain him with another ‘what’. He just glares darkly and crosses his arms in front of his - frankly impressive - chest. Hell must have a hell of a gym. Stiles chuckles at his own thought, which earns him another angry look from the demon.   
Maybe it should concern Stiles how he’s not afraid of Derek. He should be, right? He supposedly has the Lord of Destruction in his room. Yet said Lord hasn’t been very destructive up until now. He glowers and glares and he’s not very forthcoming when it comes to making smalltalk, but there hasn’t been any threat of dismemberment or eternal damnation or anything like that. In fact, Derek has been a pretty okay guy to have around, even if he is forced to be here. Damn it, now Stiles starts to feel bad about that.  
“Here, take a seat,” he says quickly, to somehow make up for the fact that he forces a demon to keep him company because he is feeling sad about being alone on his birthday. “Be careful not to sit on the cake. Melissa did a wonderful job, it’s very tasty! You do eat, do you?” Stiles suddenly remembers not having seen Derek eat before. But he drinks coffee, so food should be okay too, right?

“I do,” Derek answers gruffly. He slowly lowers his arms from their defensive stance and pulls the chair fully inside the circle. The water and soda are placed neatly on the floor and he gingerly picks up the paper plate before sitting down. If Stiles would have to describe his demeanour, he would say the demon is feeling uncomfortable. Like, socially uncomfortable. It’s weird.

The Lord of Destruction taking care not to make a mess, is equally weird. Stiles watches how Derek takes small bites of the cake, careful not to smear anything on his face. And he closes the water bottle after each drink, to prevent it from spilling if it would tip over. It makes him wonder if the demon is really the Lord of Destruction, like the description he found in that book said he was. 

“Is it good?” 

Derek looks up from the cake he was eating bit by tiny bit. He swallows the bite he had in his mouth and nods. “It is.”

Stiles smiles and puts another bite in his mouth. “This is my fourth piece and it’s still good. Melissa is truly a master baker. She makes the best birthday cakes, she has been doing it even since before my mom died.” The smile turns a little rueful a second. “My mom couldn’t bake if her life depended on it. Melissa was her best friend and she has been baking birthday cakes for me and Scott for as long as I can remember. I didn’t expect one this year, you know, with the whole pandemic going on. Melissa works in the hospital, you see, she’s a nurse. How she still found the time to make me a cake for my birthday is unbelievable.”

“It’s your birthday?” Derek seems shocked by that fact. It’s a bit hard to read his expression beneath all the scary demon stuff he’s got going on, but Stiles would guess he’s a bit miffed. Weird again.

“Uh, yeah dude. Turned 21 today.” He points to the birthday card with a glittery 21 on the front that sits on the desk behind Derek with the other cards. “Kinda sucks, you know? I’m legal now and I can’t even go out clubbing to celebrate it. I thought about going down to the liquor store, but, well… drinking by yourself is kinda sad.”  
He perks up then, beaming at his demon company. “I could -”

“Can’t get drunk,” Derek cuts him off matter of factly. 

“Oh,” Stiles slumps a bit. “That kinda defeats the point, yes.”

“I’m sorry I didn’t get you anything,” Derek says suddenly, sounding reluctant and unsure at the same time. Really, Derek is acting so strange today!

“Doesn’t matter, dude.” Stiles smiles at him, which feels weird too. Smiling at a demon. Maybe they’re both acting odd today. Or maybe it’s just Stiles. He’s celebrating his 21st birthday while a pandemic has shut down practically the whole world. Things are weird,  _ period _ . “It’s nice to have a little company, especially today. So, I guess that can be your gift. Keeping me company.”

“Isn’t that what I’ve been doing the whole time already?” Derek graciously skips over the fact that summoning a demon for the sole purpose of keeping you company is ridiculous. 

“Maybe, yes, but now you get to eat cake!”

Derek stays until he has finished his cake and the bottle of water. He doesn’t say much, but he listens to Stiles talk about how he celebrated his birthday last year. It involved underage drinking and drag queens, it was fabulous. One story leads to another and when his phone rings, his father’s picture showing up on the screen, Stiles has completely forgotten his glum mood from before. He smirks at Derek. “I guess that’s your cue, dude. Thanks for coming, I appreciate it.”

The demon’s mouth quirks, though he says nothing. He nods once and between one blink and the next the chair is empty once again.

When Stiles returns from the communal bathroom that night, there’s a non descriptive box sitting in the middle of the cardboard summoning circle that was shoved haphazardly underneath his bed. Inside the box, Stiles finds a brand new coffee machine. The type that takes real beans instead of coffee pads or even ground. There’s a small white card on top of it. ‘Happy birthday’ it says in black cursive.

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> This fic takes place during the Covid-19 pandemic, but I'll be playing a bit loose and fast with the rules and regulations the goverment has issued. It's (fan)fiction, people.
> 
> Also, I don't have a particular plan for this fic yet. I have some ideas, but I don't know yet how many chapters it'll have and how deep the whole demon lore will go. For now, I'll add chapters when I come up with new ideas for the summonings. :-)


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